Peerless Bodyguard of a Stunning Beauty

After Zhao Rong explained the truth, everyone present was dumbstruck. The three women and the assistant were especially shocked, their mouths hanging open in disbelief. ”Brother Zhao Rong, no way,” one of them stammered. ”This is too bizarre...”

Lili looked around in terror at the encircling villagers, cold sweat beading on her forehead. ”Oh my god, Brother Zhao Rong,” she said, her voice trembling. ”Does that mean if all these villagers are Thousand Year Old Demons, we’re trapped and can’t escape?”

Zhao Rong nodded. ”These villagers haven’t transformed yet,” he told Lili. ”If they do, you’ll see their true forms...”

Yu Lan stepped forward, her heart pounding in her chest. ”Brother Zhao Rong, you have to think of a way to get us out of this village full of Thousand Year Old Demons!”

Xuelian, also nervous, grabbed the village beauty and his brother by the hand. ”Brother Zhao Rong, use the space-time transporter or Instant Teleportation to get us out of here now!” she urged. ”And when we go, you have to bring the village beauty and his brother with us. We absolutely cannot leave them here! If we do, these Thousand Year Old Demons will definitely kill them.”

The assistant immediately whipped a dagger out from his belt and brandished it at the torch-wielding villagers surrounding them. ”You villagers are pretty good at hiding,” he warned. ”Even though you’re Thousand Year Old Demons, you disguised yourselves as ordinary mountain folk. But no matter how deep you buried your secret, you couldn’t escape my brother’s Eyes of Golden Flame!”

Before the assistant could finish, the circle of villagers erupted in laughter, mocking Zhao Rong’s group. ”Since you’ve seen through our disguises, you can prepare to die!”

The villager in the down jacket cackled. ”Many outsiders have entered our village and mysteriously vanished. In truth, they didn’t disappear. We captured them and refined them into Elixirs!”

When Lili heard that this vile group of demons, disguised as villagers, had been capturing humans and turning them into Elixirs, she was furious. She strode forward, spat at them, and cursed, ”You pack of Thousand Year Old Demons! You’re nothing but beasts! You’ve committed countless evil deeds and killed so many people, but good is rewarded and evil is punished. It’s not that there’s no retribution, it’s just a matter of time! You were unlucky enough to meet Brother Zhao Rong today. Just you wait! He’ll kill every last one of you, skin you alive, and pull out your tendons to avenge all the innocent people you’ve murdered!”

Hearing a mere human woman dare to mock and threaten them, the demons roared with laughter. ”Just the five of you think you can take on us Thousand Year Old Demons? Don’t you forget, this is our territory! We are demons who have cultivated for a millennium! You humans think you can escape our grasp? Just wait for us to stomp you to death!”

With that, the lead villager bellowed, ”Brothers and sisters, we’re tired of this charade! There’s no one else around tonight. Let’s transform, kill these five, and refine them into Elixirs!”

As he spoke, the group of villagers holding torches began to change.

When Zhao Rong and his four companions saw the mountain folk transform, they were utterly stunned.

Lili watched as the man in the down jacket turned into a tree spirit. ”No way! Are you kidding me?” she exclaimed in disbelief. ”That guy in the down jacket wasn’t human at all, but a thousand-year-old tree! Look, after turning into a tree demon, his skin is so wrinkled... It looks just like tree bark. It’s disgusting!”

Yu Lan saw the man in the Zhongshan suit instantly morph into a cat demon. ”I can’t believe it,” she said, amazed. ”Your village doesn’t just have plants that became demons, but animals too! To think a man like you was actually a cat demon... I never would have guessed.”

Xuelian stared as the youth in the Adi-king sportswear transformed in a flash into a pipa demon. She sucked in a sharp breath, her entire worldview shifting. ”I never would have thought that boy in the Adi-king down jacket was actually a pipa demon. This is truly incredible...”

The assistant, meanwhile, was gaping at a nearby village woman who had turned into a wild boar demon. He swallowed hard, a chill running down his spine. ”At first, I thought that woman was pretty cute, a bit like that star from the Island Country, Hatano Yui. I was actually a little into her. But I never imagined that in the blink of an eye, she’d turn into a wild boar! It’s nauseating! Thank god I only fantasized about the foreplay and didn’t imagine going all the way with that thing...”

The villagers, now in their demonic forms, tightened their circle around Zhao Rong’s group. ”The five of you came at the perfect time,” they hissed, closing in. ”Now we’ll kill you, refine you into Elixirs, and devour you!”

As the three women and the assistant saw the Thousand Year Old Demons pressing in on them, they all turned to Zhao Rong. ”Brother Zhao Rong, what do we do now?” they asked in utter terror. ”We’ve overcome so many monsters and endured so much to get here, but these are Thousand Year Old Demons! Their Mana must be incredibly high... How can we possibly defeat them?”

The assistant trembled with fear, already foaming at the mouth. ”Brother Zhao Rong, should we play dead to get out of this?” he stammered, pulling a small Foam-at-the-Mouth Pellet from his pocket.

When the three women realized he wasn’t dying but had just eaten a powder to fake it, they shot him a look of utter disdain. ”Assistant, we didn’t realize you were such a spineless coward! Don’t you have any faith that Brother Zhao Rong can eliminate these Thousand Year Old Demons?”